The recent advent of so-called “smart phones” and the demand they bring for ever-increasing network capacity is now complicating the traditional problem of simply providing reliable and ubiquitous wireless coverage for primary voice and data services. In the prior art, several solutions have been deployed to deal with the problem of increasing infrastructure, but none of these solutions are wholly satisfactory.
One natural solution to this problem, employed in the prior art, is to add additional Base Stations. Base Station architectures have traditionally been dominated by what is known as a “macro” approach, characterized by large racks of electronics enclosed in large structures, connected to antennas and sometimes to electronics on top of high towers. With this approach, a “Base Station” is actually a collection of pieces of hardware acting as individual Base Stations and contained within the same large structure. In the macro approach, adding additional carriers or bands to the pre-existing Base Station can be as simple as adding additional individual Base Stations within the structure. This is often accompanied by a reduction in the coverage of each Base Station in order to minimize inter-station interference and increase spectral re-use.
However, there are problems with the addition of Base Stations. There are significant capital and operational costs associated with each additional unit of equipment installed. Moreover, regardless of cost, the macro approach is not suitable for situations in which the density of Base Stations in a structure is already high, or in which Base Station cells have been greatly reduced in order to minimize inter-station interference and increase spectral re-use. In such cases of high infrastructure density, or small-cell coverage, the additional of large structures besides huge towers is simply impractical and will not meet public, municipal, or functional requirements.
A second solution to the problem of increasing infrastructure, employed in the prior art, is to mount Base Station equipment or repeater equipment on utility poles, traffic light polls, small buildings, and the like, instead of adding such equipment at an increasingly burdened central location. The mounting requirements of such equipment usually dictate that the equipment be more compact—both smaller and lighter—then ordinary Base Station or repeater equipment that is typically placed in a large structure. Furthermore, mounted equipment tends to be more integrated, and more weather resistant, than traditionally Base Station or repeater equipment.
Unfortunately problems exist with this second solution. Municipalities and the general public are not always tolerant or accepting of wireless equipment in public view. The public placement of such equipment has increased over time, and will simply become more prolific as the equipment and installation sites multiply. There are also the added costs of manufacturing, transporting, mounting, and maintaining such equipment. Also, space limitations at desirable sites are such that it may not be possible, at any cost, to mount Base Station or repeater equipment at desirable or nearby locations.
The solution to these problems is a practical way for the various Operators to collaborate and share infrastructure equipment.